Category B. Women and her activities, Gardiner list of signs

B is a short category. Women get the short shrift in Egyptian hieroglyphics. The sign list prepared by Hoch for his class uses only 7 so it's shown more slowly. But that doesn't mean women are not important to Egyptians. This figure B1 gets drawn a lot.

That is Hoch's sign list used to teach Middle Egyptian drawn from Gardiner's sign list.

Below is the B category from JSesh program drawn from Manuel de Codage also based on Gardner's sign list, enlarging Gardiner's list by subsequent linguists. It lists 106 different hieroglyphs for activities of women.

The F31 sign is three fox skins tied together for the value "MS" or "mes" meaning birth. It is unknown why the sign of three fox skins tied together is associated with birth. I've seen a photo of North African hut used as a birthing hut by the women with fox skins draped over the doorway. It is believed the fox skins ward off or distract or screen flies during birth. My Google Fu fails me, I can find no such photo example now. It was a video of a women going in and out of a hut with fox skins tied over the door, but spread out and not tied and arranged as the hieroglyphic. It is the single example I've seen. It is an important sign having to do with women and birth and the matriarchy. It appears in names a lot such as Rameses.